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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



MARAH 



MARAH 



OWEN MEREDITH 







w: 



NEW YORK 
LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. 

AND LONDON 
1892 



h\ij X 






Copyright, 1892 
By LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. 



TROW DIRECTORY 

PRINTING AND BOOKBINDING COMPANY 

NEW YORK 



PREFACE 



These poems, written in leisure hours during the 
past and previous years, were already in proof at 
the time of my husband's death, and he was occu- 
pied during the last few weeks of his life in revis- 
ing them. No doubt they would have received 
from himself still further correction, and he had 
ordered several privately printed copies, to submit 
to the judgment of friends. These did not arrive 
till the day after his death. 

While each of the poems is complete in itself, 
they are so arranged as to form a connected whole, 
and are meant to be read consecutively. My hus- 
band's intention was to represent progressive 



MARAH 

stages of feeling, and, in accordance with this 
design, he divided the book into four parts, each 
with its corresponding motto prefixed. There was 
a poem originally included in the first part which 
he did not think good enough, and had made up 
his mind to omit. The last days of his life were 
spent, as if in haste, in the composition of another, 
to take its place. This was never finished, but I 
give the fragment at the end of the volume, as I 
found it by his bedside, with the ink hardly dry 
on the paper. 

A longer and more elaborate poetical work is 
also ready for publication, but my husband con- 
templated publishing these shorter poems first, 
and they will, I am sure, be especially welcomed 
by the old faithful friends and admirers of "Owen 
Meredith." 

E. L. 

Bramfield House : 

Jamiary 9, 1892. 



CONTENTS 



PAGE 

PROLOGUE I 

I. 

TEARS ARE CHRISTIAN, KISSES PAGAN . . . . 4 

"THAT IS THE QUESTION" 5 

HIC INCEPIT 6 

CHI LO SA? 8 

IF .... ? . . . IO 

TELEPATHY . 15 

HER PORTRAIT 17 

DEFECTIVE TITLE 21 

INVESTITURE 22 

CORROBORATION 23 

SUMMER NIGHT 26 

vii 



MARAH 

PAGE 

AWAY ! 28 

ABSENCE 30 

WAITING 32 

DEATH 34 

II. 

/ gave her love: i gave her faith, &*c. . . 40 

experientia docet ? 41 

omens and oracles 44 

idolatry 46 

antagonisms 48 

amari aliquid 50 

ars amoris 51 

marah's dower 54 

rubies and pearls 55 

dreams 58 

figures of speech 67 

the only difference 69 

ONE ROSE 70 

BY THE GATES OF HELL 71 

WHEN ALL IS OVER 73 

viii 



CONTENTS 



III. 

PAGE 

IF THOU ART STILL A GRIEF LESS GIRL OR BOY . 78 

LIFE . . . . . ■ 79 

SEMPER EADEM 80 

FIRELIGHT . . 82 

GHOSTS 84 

NUNC STANS 87 

PERVERSITY .89 

HAUNTED 90 

EPISODE . . g2 

LIES . . . . . . . . . 94 

LOVE'S LABOUR LOST 98 

HORACE AND LYDIA {Modern) IOO 

fugiens imago iio 

still! 114 

SELENE Il6 

TRAVELLING ACQUAINTANCES 122 



MARAH 



IV. 

PAGE 

/ HAVE SEARCHED THE UNIVERSE, &c. 1 32 

SEAWARD 133 

NOCTURN 135 

OCEANUS I37 

A LOST CHANCE I43 

SATURNALIA I46 

PERTURBATION 1 53 

STORM 157 

DIMINUENDO . . . " . . . . 164 

MOONLAND l66 

SELENITES 172 

SOMNIUM BELLUINUM 1 75 



EPILOGUE 187 

APPENDIX — LORD LYTTON'S LAST POEM . . 193 



PROLOGUE 



Lured by the promise of a better land, 
They wander'd in the wilderness of Shur : 

Vagrants, from bondage fled, a weary band, 
Whose weariness each day made wearier ; 

And waterless was all the desert sand, 
No wells. at hand! 



A place at last they reach'd, in sore distress, 
Where water flow'd, but from a bitter spring. 

Then cried they, ' Here we die of thirst, unless 
God turn this bitter sweet!' And, murmuring, 

They call'd it Marah. Nor can speech express 
More bitterness. 



I. 



I 

Tears are CJiristian, kisses Pagan. Love is both, 

and each his prize. 
On his lips are Pagan kisses, Christian tears are in 

his eyes. 

2 

Magdalens with Moenads mingle in his rites, and 

round his way 
Intertwine the rose of Paphos with the thorns of 

Golgotha. 

3 
Thorn or rose, which best becomes him ? Both his 

loveliness endears : 
Roses red with Pagan kisses, thorns bedew' d with 

Christian tears I 



THAT IS THE QUESTION' 



One ask'd me suddenly if I thought her fair ; 

And then, for the first time, I felt, ' How dull 
These eyes, that have so long been unaware 

Whether she is, or is not, beautiful ! ' 



But I have had no time to find that out, 

Nor thought to spare to it from days all pass'd 

In one continual fluctuating doubt 

Whether she loves me yet, or will at last. 



HIC INCEPIT 



Something wild as the heart of a boy 
(But what is it ?) awakens in me, 

Like the love of a love, and the joy 
Of a joy, that are going to be ; 



2 

Or the nebulous beam in the breast 
Of a mist the moon brightens behind ; 

A prediction that does but suggest 
A fulfilment it leaves undefined. 

6 



H1C INCEPIT 

3 

It was born of a breath and a dream, 
Tis the soul of a look or a tone, 

And the parent of pleasures that seem 
But as preludes to others unknown. 



Yet how soon could its sweetness be kill'd 
By the pang of a premature bliss, 

And so die of a promise fulfill'd 
On the lips I am longing to kiss ! 



CHI LO SA f 



Prithee tell me, Sweet, how shall I ever 

Have deserved thee ? What trials, what tears, 

What renewals of daily endeavour, 

What endurance of sorrowful years, 

May bear witness how well I have loved thee, 

And establish my claim to thy heart ? 

Or when long thou hast tried me and proved me, 

Will it be but to bid me depart ? 

Ah, could love be obtain'd for love's sake ! 

But the gift is bestow'd, and not owed, 

Nor can worth any claim to it make. 

For the blessing of love is a boon from above 

And no heed of desert doth it take. 



CHI LO SA? 



Blowing tree, the full blossoms that bend thee 

May be all of them promises vain ! 

Who can say whether heaven will yet send thee 

The good chance of its ripening rain ? 

Glowing heart, the fond dreams that possess thee 

May be all lying prophets at best ! 

Who can say if she ever will bless thee 

With one moment of bliss on her breast ? 

Ah, could love be obtain'd for love's sake ! 

But 'tis purchased by none, nor yet won, 

Tho' to win it life's all be the stake. 

For the blessing of love is a boon from above, 

And no heed of desert doth it take. 



IF 



So you but love me, be it your own way, 

In your own time, no sooner than you will, 
No warmer than you would from day to day, 
But love me still ! 



Each day that still you love me seems to me 

A little fairer than the day before ; 
For, daily given, love's least must daily be 
A little more. 



IF . . . . ? 

3 

And be my most gain'd your least given, if such 

Your sweet will be ! I reckon not the cost, 
Nor count the gain, by little or by much, 
Or least or most. 

4 

Little or much, to me the gift I crave 

Is all in all. There is not any measure 
Of more or less can gauge the need I have 
Of that dear treasure. 



5 

So you but love me, tho' your love be cold, 

Mine it can chill not. Tho' your love come 
late, 
Mine for its coming, by sweet dreams foretold, 
Will dreaming wait. 



MARAH 



Yet ah, if some far chance, before I die, 

One hour of waking life might let me live, 
Rich with the dream'd-of dear reality 
'Tis yours to give ! 

7 
Your whole sweet self, with your sweet self's 
whole love! 
Those eyes of fire and dew, those lips wish- 
haunted, 
Those feet whose steps like elfin music move 
Thro' worlds enchanted ! 

8 
Your whole sweet self! The unutter'd thoughts 
that stir 
Your lonest musings with light wings unheard, 
And feelings that find no interpreter 
In deed or word ! 



IF 



Your whole sweet self, that, till by love reveal'd, 

Even to yourself still half unknown must be ! 
For of the wealth in souls like yours conceal'd 
Love keeps the key. 



10 

Ah, if your whole sweet self, by all the power 

Of your sweet self's whole love in some divine 
Far distant hour made wholly yours, that hour 
Made wholly mine, 



II 

And if in that blest hour all dreams came true, 

All doubts dissolved, all fears were whirl'd away 
In one wild storm of tendernesses new 
As time's first day, 



MARAH 
12 

What should we both be ? Hush ! I do not dare 

Even to hear my own heart's whisper utter'd 
Be its sole answerer the silent air 
This sigh has flutter'd ! 



TELEPA THY 



Last night we met, where others meet, 

To part as others part ; 
And greeted but as others greet, 

Who greet not heart to heart ; 



We talk'd of other things, and then 

To other folk pass'd by ; 
You turn'd and sat with other men ; 

With other women, I. 



MAR AH 



And yet a world of things unsaid 
Meanwhile between us pass'd ; 

Your cheek my phantom kiss flush'd red, 
And you look'd up at last ; 



And then your glance met mine midway 

Across the chattering crowd ; 
And all that heart to heart can say 



Was in that glance avow'd. 



HER PORTRAIT 



Her form has the mingled grace 
Of a child and a queen in one. 

There is pride in her pure young face, 
In her voice is a far-off tone, 
And her eyes have the gaze of a forest creature 
That has lived in the woods alone. 



A creature whose steps are light 
As the leaflets brusht by its brow, 

When 'tis stay'd in its buoyant flight 
By the sound of a rustling bough, 
17 



MA RAH 



And, suddenly motionless, looks and listens 
As she looks and is listening now. 



But a young queen, too, she looks. 

And I think that a woodland doe, 
If transform'd, as in fairy books, 

By the magic of long ago 
To a mystical, milk-white, maiden princess 

Would listen and look just so. 



Her summers, at most nineteen, 
Are yet short of a single score ; 

Twice as much has the number been 
Of my winters, and something more ; 
And my knowledge of life is a cramm'd museum, 
Hers only an infant's store. 

x8 



HER PORTRAIT 

5 
Yet I see but thro' her wild eyes, 

And my thoughts are whatever she thinks ; 
If she praises, I feel I am wise ; 

If she censures, my confidence sinks ; 
And, as judged by the least of her looks and glances, 
My spirit expands or shrinks. 

6 

Ihave faced the world in my day, 
And have fought it and overthrown ; 

I have struggled and won my way, 
And no rival has beaten me down ; 
Yet my courage fails, and my whole frame falters, 
If she chances to chide or frown. 

7 
Her light little step outstrips 
My stride, to ascents sublime ; 



MARAH 

Hid in shadows that haunt her lips 
Are the secrets of space and time ; 
And, attuned to the music around her moving, 
The stars in their courses chime. 



8 

She has read not the tedious tale 

Of the dead world's grief and glee, 
Nor been stirr'd by the shrill birth-wail 
Of the ages beginning to be ; 
But she carries secure at her simple girdle 
The Infinite's golden key. 

9 
I have gather'd what life can give, 
With the prizes its pains confer; 
Yet for naught do I care to live 
But to love and be loved by her. 
Fate, grant me but this, and all gains and glories 
I surrender without demur! 



DEFECTIVE TITLE 



Mine, and mine only, and all mine, 
Spirit and flesh, and brain and heart, 

By right of birth, and right divine, 
And every right but one, thou art. 



But, wanting that one right, I know 
The rest are wrongs without redress. 

Ah, child, a kingless kingdom thou, 
And I a king that's kingdomless ! 



INVESTITURE 

i 

KiNGDOMLESS ? No ! For infinite 
The kingdom is, thro' thee made mine ; 

And there I reign by royal right 
Sole lord of regions all divine. 



Nor kingless thou, whose monarch crown'd 
And robed am I, in realms afar, 

Fairer than all that here are found 
On earth. For not of earth they are. 



CORROBORA TION 



Is it the echo of a word, 

Whose lingering tones betoken 
I dream'd it not, but really heard ? 

And was it sung, or spoken ? 



Some great good news has come to me, 
I know. But who averr'd it ? 

And it is true ? And was it she 
That whisper'd, I that heard, it ? 



MARAH 



So light that whisper fell, methought 
No sense but mine it flutter'd. 

What tell-tale Spirit can have caught 
A sound so softly utter'd, 



And spread the message wide, and told 
The gathering stars to greet it 

With signals flash'd from shafts of gold, 
The sea-waves to repeat it, 



The woods its influence to attest, 

And the soft winds that heave them ? 

They all assure me I am blest, 
And I must needs believe them. 



C ORR OB OR A TION 



Stars, waves, and woods, and winds, no fear 

Have I lest you be lying, 
For to your tale my heart can hear 

The harps of Heaven replying. 



25 



SUMMER NIGHT 



The summer night fills heaven's remotest spheres 
With stars and meteors. And with fluttering 
fires 
My heart's thrill'd deeps . are throng'd by radiant 
tears 

And bright desires. 



Heaven and my heart these summer glories share. 

Nor ever, since Latona brought to birth 
The first New Moon, has summer night so fair 
Bless'd heaven and earth. 

26 



SUMMER NIGHT 
3 

Heaven's own the stars are, and the meteors 
mine 
The tears and the desires, that meteors are 
And stars of another heaven, no less divine, 
Tho' not so far. 



Tears into stars distill'd from that delight 

The nightingale to the sweet silence sings ! 
Desires that roam love's fervid infinite 
On flaming wings, 



5 
The meteor-pulses of its palpitatn blue ! 

And tears, desires, and stars, the night and I, 
All, all, are tremulous with thoughts of you, 
Each thought a joy ! 



AWAY/ 



Come away, love ! With me, love, away ! 

Far away from the world that we know, 
Far from all we have done till to-day, 

And from all we have been until now 
Far away ! 



Set impassable distance between 

All that was and that is ! And let naught 
Be remember'd, heard, spoken, or seen 

That can ever remind us of aught 
That has been ! 



AWAY ! 

3 
Of the past every vestige efface, 

With its doings, whatever they were ! 
Of each circumstance, person, and place 
That have been its accomplices, spare 
Not a trace ! 

4 
And discard with the days that are done 

All their cumbrous caparisonings ! 
Of old habitudes need have we none, 
Who have only to spread out our wings 
And be gone. 

5 
But wherever they bear us away, 

Be it far from the world that we know ! 
Far from all we have done till to-day, 
And from all we have been until now 
Far away ! 



ABSENCE 



Not in my life, but yours, I live ; 

And from myself I seem to be 
As far away, dear fugitive, 

As you are far from me. 



Unlit by you, no light have I, 

A fainting lamp that's fed by none ! 

The earth seems left without a sky, 
The sky without a sun. 



ABSENCE 
3 

Come back ! come back ! And with you bring 

All that with you is gone away, 
Warmth, light, life, love, and everything 

That stays but where you stay ! 



WAITING 



The years that are before us still 

May to our lives allot 
Mischance of many a kind, and fill 
Time's empty lap with many an ill. 

That thought affrights me not. 



But six short weeks are still to pass 

Before the long'd-for day 
That brings her back ; and these, alas ! 
If these go wrong ? The future has 

For me no worse dismay. 



WAITING 

3 
Only six weeks ! But each contains 

How many perilous hours ! 
Each hour how many possible pains, 
How many risks ! . What blights and banes 

To dread from unknown Powers ! 

4 
With her, no fears my heart appal, 

Tho' life with ills be throng'd : 
Without her, no mischance so small 
But it may prove the worst of all, 

Absence from her prolong'd ! 

5 
I dread not foes that love may find 

Along the distant track 
Of future years. But O, be kind, 
You Powers that now rule wave and wind, 

And bring her safely back ! 



DEATH 

She came not back. She will not come again ; 
And I shall never any more behold 
Her dear, dear face. But absence was worse pain 
Than death is now that Memory keeps safe hold 
Of all Hope miss'd. A pure dawn to the last 
Our love was, and no change can cloud it now. 
Here on thy grave in the eternal past, 
Heart of my heart, these fading flowers I strow. 
Here let them perish ! From their fate secure, 
Thou, where they blossom'd, deep in my dream- 
life 
(Death's changeless charm all thine) dost still en- 
dure 
Undying. More to me than bride or wife, 



DEATH 

Heaven's revelation thou remainest, seen 

First in the wish'd-for future, now seen best 

In the saved past, of love that might have been 

Less beautiful if earth had once possess'd 

Its beauty. Memory, that makes thee mine, 

Is quieter than Hope, and happier too. 

Safe are the treasures of her sober shrine, 

And even her sweetest oracles are true. 

Ah, dearest ! Thou and Death have given me all 

The blessing of a past where Memory finds 

Nothing she is not thankful to recall — 

No pain, no bitterness, no tear that blinds, 

No word that wounds ! Life might have marr'd 

all this, 
And spoilt the sweetness Death perpetuates. 
Now, all that was, unmix'd with all that is, 
Remains itself, and perfect. The harsh Fates, 
That menace all things happy, from my heart 
Thy truth can turn not, nor thy love estrange. 
Far, far, beloved, beyond my reach thou art — 



MAR AH 

But also far beyond the reach of change ! 
Safe from the years and sorrows come and gone 
Since thou didst go, who never back wilt come, 
Where is thy home now, unreturning one ? 
Has the soul anywhere a stable home ? 
Shall I rejoin thee ever ? Shall we meet 
Once more, beyond the dark and narrow gate 
Now shut between us ? Or does life still fleet 
Forever onward, still importunate, 
And still unpacified, from sphere to sphere, 
In unreposing progress to no goal ? 
So that the bliss beyond us speeding here 
Shall still beyond us speed throughout the whole 
Vast cycle of infinity, and thou 
A bliss beyond me still forever be ■? 
I know not. But no Heaven exists, I know, 
That I can gain without regaining thee. 
And if this sense of self, wherein we place 
Life's purpose, be no more than the brief play 
Of combinations that in boundless space 

36 



DEATH 

And endless time shall be dissolved away 
Into the universal consciousness, 
Whence for a while it separates us here, 
Thy soul to mine has granted none the less 
Some earthly foretaste of a heavenlier sphere ; 
With this much gain'd — that here a love so fair, 
So finely wrought, so sensitive as ours, 
Wither'd not, nor grew coarse, in that bad air 
Which brings to blossom none but poison-flowers. 

Safe-hidden, undiscover'd, undefiled 

In the still past, on thy pure grave I write 

No name, no date. And here may roses wild 

With their ungather'd growths conceal it quite ! 

So shall no curious gossips guess the way 

My secret footsteps find, escaping oft 

From life's loud throngs, when here at fall of day 

They steal in silence thro' the twilight soft. 



37 



II. 



39 



I 

I gave her love : I gave her faith and truth : 

I gave her adoration, vassalage, 
And tribute of life's best : the dream's of youth, 

The deeds of manhood, and the stores of age. 

2 

She took my gifts, and turrid them into pain. 

Each gift she made a bitter curse to be, 
Then, marrd, she gave them back to me again. 

And this is all she ever gave to me. 



EXPERIENTIA DOCET? 



Vain is the experience of the past 
To guide their steps who rove, 

By ways each different from the last, 
The 'wildering realms of Love ! 



For no new movements of the heart 

Are ever like the old, 
Nor has their tale its counterpart 

In those by Memory told. 



MARAH 



The records of the pilgrimage 
Of passion are impress'd 

Each on the renovated page 
Of a blanch'd palimpsest. 



To mock the faith that lovers place 
In life's acquired love-lore, 

New lessons, latest learn'd, efface 
Old teachings taught before. 



5 

And we ourselves within us bear, 
Tho' to ourselves unknown, 

New lives, that with new loves appear, 
And new selves of their own. 



EXPERIENTIA DOCET? 



Thus every love is, of its kind, 
A first love and a last ; 

And every time we love, we find 
That love has had no past. 



43 



OMENS AND ORACLES 



All the phantoms of the future, all the spectres 
of the past, 
In the wakeful night came round me, sighing, 
crying, c Fool, beware ! 
Check the feeling o'er thee stealing ! Let thy first 
love be thy last ! 
Or, if love again thou must, at least this fatal 
love forbear ! ' 

Mar ah Amara ! 



OMENS AND ORACLES 
2 

Now the dark breaks. Now the lark wakes. Now 
their voices fleet away. 
And the breeze about the blossom, and the 
ripple in the reed, 
And the beams, and buds, and birds begin to whis- 
per, sing, or say, 
' Love her, love her, for she loves thee ! ' And I 
know not which to heed. 

Car a A mar a ! 



IDOLATRY 



To love is to create, down here below, 

A god on earth ; and for that god do even 

More than his earthly worshipper can do 
For the great God in Heaven. 



But, since naught perfect is on earth, and none 

Entirely good, the god on earth created 
Is but a half-divine, half-devilish one; 



A god half loved, half hated. 



40 



IDOLATRY 
3 

Half loved, half hated, but so all adored 
That for its favour nothing seems a price 

Too great : not even life lost and blood pour'd 
In human sacrifice. 



And all ungrudged, for this god's worshipt sake, 
His heart's blood drop by drop the adorer gives, 

His life's life hour by hour ; nor shrinks to break 
The heart of other lives. 



ANTAGONISMS 



Ah, who can reconcile the Brain and Heart ? 

Reason and Passion ? Thought and Sentiment ? 
Genius and Woman ? Far they tend apart, 

And only meet in terrible dissent. 



Genius, sufficing to itself, abounds 
In its own being. Love can but fulfil 

Its being in another. Woman founds 
Her power upon the ruins of Man's will. 

4 8 



ANTAGONISMS 

3 
The love she gives him costs a kingdom's price, 

Tho' freely given the gift. It takes away 
His grandeur from him. And that sacrifice 

She neither understands, nor can repay. 



40 



AMARI ALIQUID 

i 

Dearest, our love is perfect, as love goes ! 

Your kisses fill my frame and fire my blood ; 
And nothing fails the sweetness each bestows, 

Except the joy of being understood. 



If, for one single moment, once alone, 

And in no more than one thing only, this 

Moreover only the most trivial one, 

You could but understand me — ah, the bliss ! 



ARS AMORIS 



The world has tangled in its web Love's wings, 

And to the captive god no freedom grants. 
Mix'd with material marketable things 
And social wants, 



Throughout the struggling ranks of Modern Life 

Love has become a means of livelihood ; 
Matter for bargain keen, or envious strife, 
Like clothes and food. 



MAR AH 



And what the Modern Man and Woman try- 
To find in love, or by its means acquire, 
Is comfort, wealth, respectability, 
A step set higher 



On life's throng'd social ladder. Nay, even less 

A luxury, a vanity, a mode, 
An attitude, a pastime, a small cess 
To Custom owed ! 



Whate'er the gain by these from love expected, 

Whether its acquisition be in pelf 
Or pleasure, it is wholly unconnected 
With love itself. 



ARS A MORIS 



For 'tis not love they love, but life provided 

With what they deem love capable of giving 
And, in the act of loving, each is guided 
By the art of living. 



Therefore, O Love, because to all life's plans 

And projects some promotion thou impartest, 
Thou still hast many zealous artisans, 
Tho' not one artist. 



MARAH'S DOWER 

Two Muses Marah's dower supply, 
And each a gift bestows : 

For all her looks are Poetry, 
And all her feelings Prose. 



54 



RUBIES AND PEARLS 



All I had to give, I gave her. First my kisses, 
then my tears. 
But the little one would have them not. ' What 
use are they ? ' she said. 
Sad, I went away, and dwelt among the tombs, 
where days are years, 
With the Witch that gathers herbs there, and 
her children who are dead. 



They and I became companions; and their dusty 
shrouds were wet 
With my flowing tears, and warm beneath my 
kiss their white lips burn'd, 

55 



MAR AH 

Till the Witch, whose graveyard-gatherings rare 
miracles beget, 
Wrought my kisses into rubies, and my tears to 
pearls she turn'd. 

3 
But she drain'd into each ruby's heart from mine 
a drop of blood, 
And a purity my spirit lost with every pearl 
that fell. 
Then she laugh'd, ' Good pearls thy tears are now, 
thy kisses rubies good, 
And the proper use of precious stones thy little 
one knows well.' 

4 
So I took my pearls and rubies to the little one I 
love, 
She that loves me not. And, when her pretty 
eyes beheld them, wild 
56 



RUBIES AND PEARLS 

Beat her little heart with eagerness its pride in 
them to prove, 
And she kiss'd and kiss'd me, weeping tears of 
pleasure like a child. 



5 

Still she wears them, still she shows them to her 
lovers with delight. 
And her little heart would break, I think, if one 
of them were lost ; 
For the sweetest of its pleasures is the envy they 
excite, 
And 'tis spoilt by no suspicion of the price that 
they have cost. 



57 



DREAMS 



A LAND of luminous azure, glowing green, 

And purple, and roseate gold, fill'd everywhere 

With fervid colour and light; and all things seen 
Clear thro' a lucid calm of cloudless air : 



The rippled sapphires of a summer sea, 
Steep'd in the sunshine of a southern sky, 

Washing warm bowery bays where tree to tree 
Loose roses link'd with labyrinthine tie 

58 



DREAMS 

3 
Among them glimmer'd many a statued flight 

Of marble stairs, beneath the twinkling gloss 
Of blossom-laden boughs : and streams shone 
white, 
Streaking green glens faint rainbows roof'd 
across : 

4 
Seaward on sunny slopes a little town 

Sparkled with terraced streets, where all day 
long 
A glad-faced folk went sauntering up and down, 
Whose talk was tuned to some soft foreign 
tongue : 

5 
Foreign, at least, their tongue to me and you ; 
For you and I, dropp'd who knows how down 
here, 
Were strangers from afar ; and so we two 
To one another had grown strangely near. 

59 



MARAH 

6 

All this I dream'd. Then woke, and with dim 
gaze 

Saw, thro' the window-curtains half withdrawn, 
Wan street-lamps film'd beneath a frozen haze, 

And snow-flakes falling in the wintry dawn. 

7 
And all at once, with a recurrent pain, 

I realised how far away you were, 
How near at hand my troubles ! And then again 
I slept, and dream'd. Ah, what a change was 
there ! 

8 

Nor sea nor land this time. No nature. All 
Was artificial. For I stood, methought, 

In a vast house of many mansions : hall 

Succeeding hall : huge chambers, richly wrought 



DREAMS 
9 

In clear communication each with each, 
Thro' multitudes of doors set open wide, 

And lit by windows so far out of reach 
That they reveal'd not anything outside. 



10 

Around me, here and there, and to and fro, 
A wistful crowd continually went. 

I knew them not. Nor did they seem to know 
Each other. All were silent : each intent 



ii 

On his own business, or his own design. 

No care had I to guess what that might be ; 
For 1 was equally intent on mine, 

Heedless of others as they were of me. 

61 



MAR AH 



12 



And conscious all the while, I knew not how, 
That somewhere in this house, among that 
crowd, 
I was to find you ; tho' no sign to show 
Where was vouchsafed me, and no guide 
allow'd. 

13 
So, on, through those innumerable doors, 

Door after door, in search of you I pass'd, 
And over those interminable floors, 

Floor after floor, with steps that hasten'd fast, 

14 
And fiercely beating heart. But nowhere you, 

Nor any trace of you ! And time went by, 
The light began to fail, my courage too, 

And then I noticed all were gone but I. 



DREAMS 

15 
Gone ! By what means ? Impossible to guess ! 

For go, I could not. Each room only led 
Into another room. A wilderness 

Of rooms and rooms on all sides round me 
spread ! 

16 

To deep discouragement succeeded fear — 

A fear lest I forever should remain 
Wandering about in that mad maze of drear 

And darkening halls! I knew my search was 
vain, 

17 
And that I should not ever find you there. 

My one thought was to get away — get back 
To the outer world, and nature, and fresh air. 

Vain thought ! The night, that crept upon my 

track, 

63 



MAR AH 



18 



Was bringing with it who could say what strange 
New horror ? And still wandering, still astray, 

I roam'd and roam'd that never-ending range 
Of rooms and rooms, whence still there was no 
way. 

19 

Door after door I tried. No door was shut. 

But door to door succeeded, hall to hall. 
None to my flight did any barrier put, 

But egress was in turn denied by all. 



20 

I turn'd, despairing, to the windows. These 
Might favour flight, I hoped, if once attain'd. 

But no ! For they receded by degrees 
As I advanced, and out of reach remain'd. 

64 



DREAMS 
21 

At last I noticed, close at hand, what seem'd 
A shut door in the wall. And ' Here, per- 
chance, 

From this bewildering labyrinth,' I deem'd, 
1 May be some means for my deliverance ! ' 

22 

I push'd the latchet, hope with fear and doubt 
Contending. The door open'd. From the 
shelf 

Of some dark cupboard it disclosed, sprang out 
A corpse. I knew it. 'Twas my own dead Self. 

23 
And my dead Self pursued me. Fast I fled. 
But fast it follow'd. Its sepulchral breath 
Clung like a cloud about me. It was dead, 
And yet unnaturally alive in death. 
65 



A1ARAH 
24 

The horror and the terror of it grew 

Until they reach'd the point of madness. Then 
The whole wild vision from my sense withdrew, 

And, spent and faint, I lay awake again ; 

But still in fear lest on me sleep should glide, 
And again fix me with its ghostly fetter; 

A doubting hand I stretch'd to the bedside, 

And there I found (thrice woe is me !) your 
letter. 

26 

Your dreadful letter, with its heartless words ! 

A trance my life since that sick moment seems, 
Whence never any waking hour affords 

Release from days far worse than night's worst 
dreams. 

66 



FIGURES OF SPEECH 



Ah, still even strangers' lips renew 

The magic of your name ! 
Last night, when some one spoke of you, 

I felt my blood turn flame. 



Your fair friend said, ' Tho' so besought, 

And so admired, how free 
From vanity, how pure in thought, 

And true in deed, is she ! 

6 7 



MARAH 
3 

' Her soul's even fairer than her face. 

Do you not think so too ? ' 
And with beatified grimace 

I lied, and said, ' I do.' 



68 



THE ONL Y DIFFERENCE 



I deem'd you truest of the true, 

And loved you. Now I see 
That you were treacherous thro' and thro', 

And love you still, woe's me ! 



The only difference is this : 
The gilt is off the chain, 

And what was once a golden bliss 
Is now an iron pain. 



60 



ONE ROSE 



My blessing on you, roses, all save one ! 

Curst be the blood-red rose she used to wear 
In those fierce summers that have slain my sun, 

To lure love to her bosom and her hair ! 



The past's spent torments does that rose renew. 

Hot from my heart its hated petals take 
The blood that gives them their ensanguined hue, 

And all my life is paler for its sake. 



BY THE GATES OF HELL 

i 

Where the shadow of darkness darkest fell 
In the Valley of Tears, by the Gates of Hell, 

I was 'ware of an old man, wan as a ghost. 
He was bitterly weeping : and there for years, 
By the Gates of Hell, in the Valley of Tears, 

He had wept and wept for a loved one lost. 

2 

' Be consoled ! ' I said. ' For the Gates of Hell 
Thou hast pass'd not yet, and the griefs that dwell 

In the Valley of Tears, be they ne'er so sore, 
Yet by little and little they pass away, 
And by little and little there comes a day 

When the day that was is a grief no more.' 



MA RAH 

3 
' I have pass'd thro' worse than the Gates of Hell, 
And I know,' he said, ' that for those 'tis well 

Who are weeping the loved one lost by death. 
For by little and little their grief goes by, 
And the dead are forgot, and the living will die, 

And a hope still lingers the grave beneath. 

4 
' But as bitter and fierce as the pangs of Hell 
(For there is not a hope in their long farewell) 
Are the tears that are shed, on no grave that's 
seen 
For the loss of a loved one lost by life. 
And each tortures the heart, like a burning knife, 
With the trace of a day that in vain has been.' 



72 



WHEN ALL IS OVER 



When you and I are dead, when all is over, 
Life's long confusions clear'd, love's trials past, 

The truth, they hid and hurt, will you discover, 
And know and understand me at the last ? 
When all is over! 



And will you then be sad for all I suffer'd ? 

You, to whose trusted hand's mistrustful blow 
This poor wrong'd heart's defenceless fondness 
offer'd 
So safe a mark ! Will you be sad to know 
The pain it suffer'd ? 



MARAH 



If so, perchance what might have been, and was 
not, 
You then will honour more than what has been ; 
And life, when lost, will have what now it has 
not, 
Your wish, at least, that its set suns had seen 
The day that was not. 



That was not, but that would have been, my 
dearest, 
Had you had faith in it, or faith in me ! 
For that day's dawn, tho' long delay'd, was near- 
est 
Just when you chose that it should never be 
Our day, my dearest. 

74 



WHEN ALL IS OVER 



If, even when all is over, still you never 
Will know or understand, then must I pray 

That death be one long dreamless sleep forever, 
If more than now you know, you never may, 
Still never, never ! 



But if you know at last, and sigh to know it 
Too late, that sigh will all my pain requite. 

Better too late than never ! Could death show it, 

I think 'twould, even then, set all things right 

To know you know it. 



75 



III. 



77 



I 
If thou art still a griefless girl or boy, 

In love with life, and ignorant of love's grave, 
Read not herein ! For thee no gift have I, 

And be thou thankful that no gift I have ! 

2 
But if time's wayworn traveller thou art, 

Hail, pilgrim ! ' Tis for thee this book was 
writ. 
The same sad pilgrimage, the? far apart, 
We two have made, arid know the pain of it. 



78 



LIFE 

What is life ? The incessant desiring 
Of a joy that is never acquired ; 

And, instead of that joy, the acquiring 
Of enjoyments that are not desired. 



79 



SEMPER EADEM 



The years go by. They bring no change, but only 
The curse of custom, adding length to grief, 

And pressure to the crowd that makes more lonely 
The lone heart's changeless longing for relief. 



Relief from wretched memories of things lost, 
Relief in words that find no utterance now, 

Relief from dead love's still undying ghost, 
Relief in tears that lon^ have ceased to flow ! 



80 



SEMPER EADEM 
3 

O could I weep, weep, weep away this weight 
Of tearless, time-worn, inarticulate pain, 

Whose heavy burden no blest hopes abate ! 
O for release, rest, death ! In vain, in vain ! 



Si 



FIRELIGHT 

i 

A FEELING to-night comes o'er me 
That once in this hearth's dim gleam 

I was happy beyond all dreaming, 
But it may have been only a dream. 



A dream or a memory is it, 

That here in the same soft glow 

Two entranced ones nestled together 
And that I was one of the two ? 



FIRELIGHT 

3 
I seem to remember a gladness 

That haunted of old this spot. 
But was it mine or another's ? 

Ah, that I remember not ! 



'--- 



GHOSTS 



We died, she and I, the same day. That I know ; 

Tho' we died, I remember not when ; 
But together we died ; and I cannot guess how 

We are here with the living again. 



We ought to be both in our graves : and this much 

I can tell by the shuddering thrill 
That a dead corpse feels at the casual touch 

Of a corpse more inanimate still. 

8 4 



GHOSTS 



But spells we obey, and are bound by their guile, 
Dead and gone tho' we be, to contrive 

For the sake of appearance to chatter and smile, 
And pretend to be feeling alive. 



4 
I know, little friend, tho' defunct, you can do 

With the smallest allowance of rest. 
'Twas the joy of your life to be seen, and to go 

About everywhere, daintily dress'd. 



5 
You never were glad to get early to bed ; 

And this constantly gadding about, 
As you liked it alive, may have charms for you 
dead. 
But for me — it is wearing me out ! 
85 



MA RAH 



Do, dear, for the sake of the days that are gone, 
Put me back in my coffin and pall ! 

Nothing black for my burial need you put on, 
Nor be miss'd from the liveliest ball. 



7 

From asking the living to lend me a hand 
To get back to my grave, I refrain ; 

For I fear lest the living should misunderstand 
What 'tis hard for the dead to explain. 



8 

But you are as little alive, dear, as I. 

And I have not a sister or brother 
To vouchsafe me this service. Nor can you deny 

That the dead have a claim on each other. 



NUNC STANS 



Ah, the dead they may bury their dead, 
The unborn bring to birth their unborn, 

But, ere life's flitting minute be fled, 
Let us live, and laugh sorrow to scorn ! 



Past and Future, the permanent states 
Of the fugitive Present, fleet fast 

With its flight, that in flying creates 
The fixt forms of the Future and Past. 

87 



MAR AH 
3 

Borne along in its boundless embrace, 
The brief moments the centuries span ; 

And thro' time, as his shadow thro' space, 
Does the Present accompany man. 



88 



PERVERSITY 

Restless, unthankful, in a heaven all shining 
With lights serene my fever'd spirit doth dwell ; 

And wild thro' Paradise it wanders, pining 
For the hot feasts of Hell. 



8q 



HA UNTED 

For years (How many years ? To me they seem'd 

Hundreds of thousands. With eternity 
Of torment every moment of them teem'd !) 

The all-enduring slave of Pain was I. 
At last, this servitude to suffering grew 

Grievous beyond endurance. I arose, 
And in revolt my tyrant, Pain, I slew. 

A secret, dark, and hollow spot I chose 
Among the ruin'd places of the past, 

And buried murder'd Pain there. Then I went 
Forth, an emancipated slave at last, 

And mingled with the world, and was content, 
9 o 



HA UNTED 

And feasted, and made merry ; laughing, ' This 

Is life, and life is beautiful again ! ' 
But in mid-revel I began to miss 

Something which I had buried with dead Pain. 
I knew not what : but for the want of it 

I could not take my pleasure as before 
In pleasant things. A shadow seem'd to flit 

Beside me, always sighing, ' Nevermore ! ' 
So from the revellers I stole away 

Homeward. And here upon my hearth I found 
A Spectre sitting. It was husht, and grey, 

And ghastly. Its dim hooded brows were bound 
With poisonous nightshade. A cold hand it laid 

Upon me. My soul sicken'd. Helplessly 
I groan'd, ' What art thou ? ' and the Spectre said, 

1 The ghost of Pain, whose name is now Ennui ! ' 



EPISODE 



I LOVE thy body better than thy soul. 

I love thy beauty better than thy heart. 
To me the part is dearer than the whole 
Of all thou art. 



For our lips naturally meet : but not 

Our natures, not our thoughts. Far, far from 
thine 
My spirit wanders lone. Thy heart hath got 
No key to mine. 

92 



EPISODE 



And 'tis adultery I commit with thee : 

For to another woman I am wed ; 
Tho', save in dreams, her face I shall not see 
Till I am dead. 



We miss'd each other in the porch of Birth, 

And there took different ways : mine earthward 
set 
And hers I know not whither. But on earth 
We have never met. 



93 



LIES 

Ah, let me gaze still silent in those eyes, 

Nor ask me what my soul is seeking there ! 

Tho' all that there is sought and found be lies, 

If you and I on their false witness swear 

Our love is love forever, were it wise 

To test a fraud that is for both so fair ? 

Faith in it turns to treasures that I prize, 

The faint scent breathing from your fawn-brown 

hair 
And foam-white throat ; the subtle mysteries 
Of mellow shadow that have each its lair 

94 



LIES 

In your lip's dimple ; or the rose that dies 
Along your cheek's smooth curve ; and the rich 

air 
Haunted with flutterings of entranced surprise 
Round the warm edges of white vesture where 
Those shy feet peep. Nor are the sorceries 
Of this sweet fraud mine only. For you share 
The fervid fascinations that arise 
From wishes sure to wither if it were 
Too soon mistrusted. Love's grand tragedies 
Leave we, with all the pomps of their despair, 
To souls heroic ! Why should we despise 
(We, whose hearts unheroically care 
More for the moments than the eternities) 
Even the least of little joys, whate'er 
Their source, that flush one minute as it flies 
With radiant fervours of effulgence rare ? 
And if fond fancies aid them to disguise 
Their fleeting earthliness in forms that wear 
The hues of heaven (like wavelets, distant skies 



MARAH 

Paint as they pass), need fretful forethought tear 
From their poor wings those borrow'd pagean- 
tries ? 
What if some thunder-cloud soon quench the 

flare 
Wherewith Desire's small bonfires humanise 
One spot in the wide desert, whence they scare 
The savage beast ? No star whose beam sup- 
plies 
Guidance or light, along the dark we dare 
In blind pursuit of unknown destinies, 
Will perish with it. Nor does Fate declare 
Her will beforehand, tho' besought with sighs, 
And groans, and tears, and supplicative prayer. 
A miser's thrift is in each mad surmise 
That starves the present for the thankless heir. 
Who knows what plagues the future may devise 
For those whose craft its blessings would en- 
snare ? 
Life's end may be to-night. The hour that hies 

9 6 



LIES 

Is, while it lasts, life's all. So, if I swear 
I love you, ask not what the oath implies, 
But swear you love me also. We should fare 
No better for the doubts that oath defies. 
How sad were life, if bitter truth went bare 
And what were love itself without such lies ? 



97 



LOVE'S LABOUR LOST 



In the old Piazza at Florence a statue of David 
stands. 
'Tis the masterful work of Michael Angelo's 
marvellous art, 
Yet a failure nevertheless : for it came to the 
master's hands, 
Not a virgin block intact, but already rough- 
hewn in part. 



And what Mino da Fiesole did to it, Angelo could 
not undo. 
So the work was but half his own. It is finish'd, 
yet incomplete. 

9 8 



LOVE'S LABOUR LOST 

As that statue to Michael Angelo hundreds of 
years ago, 
So are you at this moment to me : an achieve- 
ment, and yet a defeat ! 



3 
'Tis that others have been before me, of whose 
touch you retain the trace. 
You are half my work, half theirs. Thro' your 
spirit and flesh disperst 
Is the mark of a love not mine, that my own love 
cannot efface. 
For you were not virgin marble when you came 
to my hands at first. 



HORACE AND LYDIA 
{Modern.) 

He 

You ask me, * Do I love you ? ' Yes. 

' What grace in you my worship wins ? ' 
None. ' Why, then, do I love you ? ' Guess ! 

Why does the sinner love his sins ? 
The drunkard his habitual dram ? 

The gambler counters, cards, and dice? 
A slave to vicious wants I am, 

And you are my inveterate vice. 

She 
Impertinent ! 



HORACE AND LYDIA 



He 





For truth you call, 


Truth, and truth or 


ily. My reply, 


Tho' 


it offend you 


She 

Not at all ! 

He 


Was, 


every word of it 


She 

A lie! 



He 

No! 



MARAH 



She 



Yes ! For all of flaming fire 
Your fancy is, your heart all ice. 

He 

Granted. That means that my desire 
Is vicious ; you, its object, vice. 

She 

No. It means only, thankless friend, 

That your desire has flights insane, 
And I, beyond whose reach they tend, 

Know that the goal they seek is vain. 
Your dupe I am not. You deceive 

Yourself, it may be, but not me, 
When you aver, perhaps believe, 

You love me. Ah, but you would be 



HORACE AND LYDIA 

As little to my liking then 

As all the others are, if you 
(In nothing else like other men) 

Did, or could, love me as they do ! 
You do not love me. I suggest 

Love fancies. Each for each is full 
Of riddles that remain half guess'd, 

And doubt, at least, is never dull. 
You ought to feel, could you but share 

My wisdom, thankful I am not 
The woman that you wish I were. 

To take delight in such a lot 
As your caprice for love provides, 

A woman should be either blind 
And a born innocent besides, 

Or else of a perverted mind — 
Like me ! Who deign with cheerfulness 

To be the subject, tho' I know 
That of your singular caress 

I never was the object. No ! 
io 3 



MARAH 

There lives no woman you could love 

Fairly, for love's sake : tho' from each 
You crave in turn what soars above, 

Or fleets beyond, a woman's reach. 
Ay, and a man's reach, too ! For this 

Ferocious idol, this Afar, 
This phantom fetish, from a kiss 

Could never yet create a star ! 



He 

True. All its miracles require 

The faith of two believers. One 
Suffices not. And I aspire 

In vain, for I aspire alone. 
Our aims accord not. Mine, that was 

High to uplift us both, has fail'd. 
Yours was to drag me down. Alas, 

And it is yours that has prevail'd ! 



HORACE AND LYD1A 



She 



To drag you down ! You found me here 

Where you were glad to find me, I 
To welcome you. My natural sphere 

I keep. Its hospitality 
You sought, and all ungrudged 'twas given ; 

Nor did you spare the proffer'd feast. 
If, just because earth is not Heaven, 

I make the best of earth, at least 
For the best gift earth has to give 

Let us be thankful ! Me you blame, 
And you I tease ; yet we contrive 

To charm each other all the same. 
Earth's child am I, for Heaven unfit. 

But I deserve some earthly praise 
For kindliness, good looks, and wit, 

Altho' not wings I wear, but stays. 
All my past lovers I have spoil'd 

For other women. Here on earth 



MAR AH 

You will not find my better. Foil'd 
Beforehand, seek ! I know my worth. 

After me, nothing! Search all round, 
What is there left to find ? 



He 

What they, 
The Poet and the Sage, have found : 
The Abstract ! 



She 

Has the Abstract, pray. 
Lips, limbs, and life ? You will but find 

Another woman, and a worse, 
With faults as little to your mind, 

Tho' not the same as mine, of course. 



106 



HORACE AND LYDIA 



He 



I came into your life too late, 

And found you thus, completely made. 
I needs must either love or hate 

The thing you are without my aid. 
And I would be a maker. 



She 

Friend, 

Nature would be beforehand still 
With all your work. Defeats attend 

The usurpations of her will. 
Perfection clothed in petticoats 

Is youth's Chimaera. This sad truth 
Your poets sing in mournful notes, 

Your sages preach. The fault of youth 



MAR AH 

Is always to exaggerate, 

And therefore miss the mark. Between 
Life's two extremes, in me kind Fate 

Accords you now the golden mean. 
If one you found with warmer blood 

Than mine is, she would be less fair. 
Another's milk-white maidenhood 

Would lack intelligence. Beware! 
To us complacent circumstance 

Is well disposed. Our fates are free. 
And I would be your last romance, 

As you are my first poem. See ! 



He 



Ah, sceptic, cease ! I can nor fight 
Nor fly the field. Your lips and eyes 

Disarm my reasonings. You are right, 
And they are wrong. Be yours the prize 

I08 



HORACE AND LYDIA 

That Pallas ever fails to win ! 

Lay your hand on my heart once more ! 
What is it beats so wild within, 

If love it be not ? 

She 

Shut the door! 



109 



FUGIENS IMAGO 



I HAVE seen her, O how often I have seen her, 
but to see 
Her mysterious evanescence, at a glance, a 
touch, a tone, 
And how often, O how often, has my heart ex- 
claim'd, ' Tis she ! ' 
When, in turning to embrace her, I discover'd 
she was gone ! 



Gone as soon as greeted ! Lost as soon as found ! 
And then again 
All the search for her to recommence, discour- 
aged, otherwhere ! 



FUGIENS IMAGO 

All the doubt, ' Will not the next search, as the 
last was, be in vain ? 
Was it she herself, or only a mirage of painted 
air?' 

3 
Nay ! I could not be mistaken, could not see her 
and not know, 
Could not take her for another ! I, whose life 
has all been pass'd 
In predicting her arrival, be its coming ne'er so 
slow, 
And rejoicing in her presence, be its going ne'er 
so fast ! 

4 

In the moment that I saw her, she was there. 
This much is sure. 
All the rest may be illusion ; all the time that 
went before, 



MAR AH 

All the time that follow'd after ! For 'tis false- 
hoods that endure, 
It is truth that, coming, going, lasts a moment 
and no more. 

5 
She is gone, and I have lost her ! Yet a little 
while ago 
She was there ; and for a moment in your eyes 
I saw her smile, 
In your voice I caught her accents, on your lips I 
felt the glow 
Of her kiss, and I am certain she was there, tho' 
but a while. 



Had you recognised her also, had you known her 
as I knew, 
It had then been well for both of us. But, thro' 
some fault in each, 



FUGIENS IMAGO 

Now the search for her, you cannot aid, must all 
begin anew, 
And the moment we retain'd not is already out 
of reach. 

7 
Hush! No vain recriminations! Life has years 
to count upon, 
But for love are moments only. Love, that all 
the whiles between, 
Looking forward to their coming, or recalling 
them when gone, 
Bears two names: the one, ' I SHALL be! 'and 
the other, ' I HAVE BEEN ! ' 



"3 



STILL ! 



I HAVE invok'd with songs, and sued with tears, 
A love still unresponsive to my call. 

To find it, I have roam'd the waste of years ; 
To win it, spent my all. 



Yet still do I believe in it, still cherish 
An unrequited faith, and in the fume 

Of fires unblest, that on its altars perish, 
Life's substance still consume ; 



STILL I 

3 
Like some poor alchemist, whose days have pin'd 

In bondage to bright dreams that but betray'd, 
Still raking ruin'd crucibles to find 

The gold he never made. 



SELENE 



WHITE Moon, forth-pouring floods of pallid fire 
From founts that leave thy sallow orb forever 
Ravaged and sear'd, and worn with wan desire, 
But fervid never ! 



Bless the pale pleasures of my love and me, 

Whose day of life, like thine, is the dark night ! 
From all the world I have chosen one like thee 
For my delight. 



SELENE 

3 

No burning pulse her livid beauty warms. 

But light that maddens the moon-stricken 
brain 
Is in her looks, and in her cold white arms 
Are dreams insane. 

4 
Like thine her chill enchantments ! And like 
thine 
My wistful vigils ! And of all we are, 
Each to the other, the sidereal sign 
Is thy weird star. 

5 
Hushful, as o'er the bosom of the deep 

Thou bendest, all night long I bend above 
The soul that in her beauty lies asleep, 
Dreaming of love. 



MA RAH 

6 

Dreaming of love, not loving ! Laid in trance 

That waits the awakening touch of some caress 
Not yet divined for its deliverence, 
And still to guess. 



Guide with the ghostly lamp's soul-reaching ray, 

Desire's meandrous labyrinths among, 
My slow sweet search, enamour'd of delay, 
And lingering long ! 

8 

My slow sweet search that dreads yet craves the 
goal 
It seeks by ways bewilderingly dense 
With dim delights, whose languors lap the soul 
In charm'd suspense ! 

118 



SELENE 

9 

She whom I love has from the dawn of time 

Been love's despair. All pleasure and all pain 
Her breath begets. All virtue and all crime 
Are her domain. 



10 

Her intricate charm is like a magic maze, 

Whose central secret never can be found 
By any of the interminable ways 
That wind it round. 



n 

The perilous realms of Unreality 

Her witchcraft rules. And my pale paramour 
Fills all their phantom forms, from her faint sigh, 
With strenuous power. 



MAR AH 



12 



Fierce are the Solar Daughters of the South, 

Faint, and a Lunar Witch, my leman is. 
The North's lone mystery lingers on her mouth, 
And chills her kiss. 



13 

The sun is in their veins, as in the vine : 

The moon in hers, as in a sorcerer's cruce, 
Has mingled dews and dreams. Their blood is 
wine : 

Hers, morphian juice. 

14 

And 1 have drunk of it. And in her eyes 
I have beheld, and on her lips pursued, 
Passion's most mystical epiphanies ; 
With faith renew'd 



SELENE 

In the voluptuous chastities of vice — 
Virginities of sin in joys restrain'd, 
Fruits of the imperishable paradise 
Of the Unattain'd ! 



TRAVELLING ACQUAINTANCES 



On my road at the dawn of day 
Joy accosted me, passing me by. 
We were both of us going one way ; 
But, alas, he went faster than I, 
And in vain I besought him to stay. 



' Prithee speed not,' I panted, ' so fast, 
Fellow-traveller ! Fain would I be 



TRA VELLING ACQ UA/NTA NCES 

Thy companion, and share to the last 
The long course of my journey with thee ! ' 
Never pausing, however, he pass'd. 



' We can fare not together,' he cried, 

' Any farther. But do not despond ! 

We may meet yet again.' And I sigh'd, 

f Where again may I meet thee ? ' ' Beyond ! ' 

Joy, pointing his finger, replied. 



4 

' A remembrance,' he murmur'd, ' meanwhile 
('Tis the best that my passage bestows) 
I bequeath thee, sad days to beguile.' 
And he flung me a half-wither'd rose ; 
And was gone with a nod and a smile. 
123 



MARAH 



5 



On I went, till the noon had wax'd hot. 
Then I came to a blossoming grove. 
There, alone in a flowery spot, 
I was suddenly greeted by Love. 
But I trembled, and answer'd him not. 



6 

For his face was the face of a stranger, 

And I seem'd to myself to be there 

A forbidden and trespassing ranger. 

And, beholding Love's weapons, ' Beware ! ' 

Said my heart to me. ' Here there is danger.' 



124 



TRA VELLING AC QUA I NT a NCES 



But the whisper of Love was so sweet, 
And the spell of his beauty so strong, 
And with welcome so warm did he greet, 
And so tenderly drew me along, 
That I fell down faint at his feet. 



8 

Merry butterflies hither and thither 
Were a-wooing. Sweet birds caroll'd clear. 
All around, it was midsummer weather. 
And I said, ' This is Paradise ! Here 
Let us linger forever together ! ' 



125 



MARAH 



9 

With a frown Love averted his face, 
And his voice took a menacing tone, 
As he struggled to break mine embrace, 
Crying, 'Loose me, for I must be gone! 
I have linger'd too long from the chase.' 



10 

' If thou leavest me, what shall I do ? ' 
I cried, clinging, imploring, and fond. 
1 And ah, whither away wouldst thou go ?' 
Love impatiently answer'd, ' Beyond ! ' 
And the sunshine seem'd turned into snow. 



126 



TRA VELLING A C QUA I NT A NCES 



II 

'If,' I wept, 'thy last word has been spoken, 
Cruel fugitive, ere thou depart, 
Leave me one little lingering token ! ' 
Then he struck me a blow at the heart, 
And I felt in it something was broken. 



12 

I arose, sick, and faint, and in pain, 
But still, staggering, onward I went, 
Till the sun was low down, and the plain 
Sad and cold, and its colours all spent, 
And the daylight beginning to wane. 



127 



MARAH 



13 



Rough and hard was the way, tho' down hill ; 
And my feet were both weary and sore ; 
And the road I was journeying still 
Had a narrower track than before ; 
And the twilight hung heavy and chill. 



H 

Where around me the long shadows lay, 
And the path became doubtful and dim, 
I was met by a traveller grey ; 
And his aspect was furtive and grim, 
Like a beast's that is prowling for prey. 



128 



TRA VELLING AC QUA I NT A NCES 



15 

He approach'd me, and seized, and embraced. 
As he cried to me, • Welcome at last ! 
It is late, but I am not in haste, 
And we too have no need to go fast. 
Thou art weary, and I am slow-paced.' 



16 

' Of my hand,' I groan'd, writhing, ' let go P 
For I neither could loosen nor bear 
The cold pressure of his. But, ' Ah, no ! ' 
The grey traveller said. ' I am Care. 
Love and Joy have gone from thee, I know. 



129 



MA RAH 



*7 



But my fingers hold faster,' said he, 

' Than the bite of an adamant bond.' 

' Is there nowhere, then, refuge from thee?' 

I exclaim'd in despair. And ' Beyond,' 

He said faintly, ' perchance there may be ! ' 



130 



IV. 



I 

/ have searclid the universe, beneath, above, 
And everywhere with this importunate lyre 

Have wander d desperately seeking Love, 
But ever yzv here have only found Desire. 

2 

/ have probed the' spheres above, the spheres be- 
neath. 

Their dim abysms have echdd to my shout 
Invoking Truth. But time, space, life, and death, 

And joy, and sorrow, only answer d 'Doubt ! ' 



SEAWARD 



The green grows ever greyer as we pass ; 

The lean soil sandier ; the spacious air 
More breezy ; raggeder the bristly grass ; 

And the few crooked leafless trees more rare. 



And now nor grass, nor trees ! But only stones 

Tufted with patches of wild rosemary 
And spurge. Behind them hidden, something 
moans ; 
And large white birds come with a questioning 
cry. 

133 



MARAH 
3 

What's there, beyond ? A thing unsearch'd and 
strange ; 
Not happier, but different. Something vast 
And new. Some unimaginable change 

From what has been. Perchance the end at 
last? 



'34 



NOCTURN 

i 

Roll, waves ! To rest refused I too aspire. 

Weep, clouds! I too shed tears that fall in 
vain. 
Lightnings, illuminate ye my drear desire! 

Thunder, be thou the echo of my pain ! 



Black-shrouded midnight, shuddering with cold 
sighs, 

And fearful with faint creepings, gather all 
Thy ghosts and spectres ! Bid them each devise 

New horrors to adorn thy sable hall ! 



MA RAH 
3 

For the drear drama the drear stage prepare, 
Deck it with deluge, garland it with storm, 

Assemble all the Powers of Darkness there, 
And what I suffer let them then perform ! 



4 
Not long will they their fleeting parts sustain 

In the fixt misery I endure alone. 
To-morrow's sun will scatter to-night's rain ; 

When comes the dawn the darkness will be 



5 
To-morrow will the storm its force have spent ; 

But mine will be to-morrow and to-morrow 
The same unutterable discontent, 

Stung by the same intolerable sorrow ! 
i 3 6 



OCEANUS 



LIKE a strong, beautiful, ill-used wild beast, 

The Ocean, caged between its craggy shores, 
Stretches its long limbs out, with panting breast, 
And rolls, and roars. 



2 

Its large lair is for its large life too small. 

For here are the world's waters all in one, 
And all the sounds of all the nations, all 
In a single tone ! 
137 



MARAH 

3 
Hark ! With the monstrous murmurs of the 
Pnyx 
Here do a hundred thousand litanies 
From Christendom's cathedral organs mix ; 
And here the sighs 

4 
Breathed by a million breaking hearts are heard ; 
Here the long roar of the fierce Roman crowd 
Comes rolling Capitolian echoes, stirr'd 
To response loud 

5 
When Caesar graced the gladiatorial show, 
And from the reeking circus rose to him 
The death-shriek of the doom'd who died below, 
Torn limb from limb. 
138 



OCEANUS 



Harken again ! A whisper from afar, 

Faint, but how fearful ! Like the sighing breath 
Of some plague-smitten city, a red star 
Scorches to death. 



7 
But from the silence the sound preys upon 

It gathers strength, and breaks into low thunder 
As of a huge host heavily marching on, 
Laden with plunder. 



Italy, when the midnight moons went down 

Long ages since upon her dark blue plains, 
Heard it, and shudder'd. Heard the tongues un- 
known, 

The rumbling wains, 
139 



MAR AH 

9 
The riot of barbarian vanquishers, 

The mountains moving to the Ostian shore 
Over those beautiful bruised limbs of hers, 
With an ominous roar. 



Ay ! All earth's sounds, on all earth's waters 
borne, 
Meet here in dreadful interchange. And over 
Ocean's drear bosom, beating wings forlorn, 
Lost echoes hover. 



II 

The echoes of all sorrows and all crimes 
Suffer'd or perpetrated long ago 



In miserable old remorseless times 
Of sin and woe. 



OCEAN US 



12 



Therefore does terror haunt thy solitude, 

Dread Sea ! And all its melancholy waves 
And mountainous billows, by wild ghosts pursued, 



Are wandering graves. 



13 
Yet 'mid thy moanings multitudinous 

A silenced song's pathetic echo floats, 
Slight but still sweet. What is it moves me thus 
In those low notes ? 



14 
It is that in a holier happier time 
• The harp of Orpheus lull'd thy lyric shores, 
And thou hast listen'd to the rhythmic chime 
Of Argo's oars : 



MA RAH 

It is that Aphrodite's natal morn 

Beheld her borne upon thine azure breast, 
And once thy furrow'd desert, now forlorn, 
Was Alcyon's nest. 



142 



A LOST CHANCE 



The glimpses of the moon with fitful lights, 
That flash'd and fled between swift cloud-drifts 
sweeping, 

Strew'd all the dark sea. And the Water Sprites 
Merrily in those moony gleams were leaping. 



I saw them, and amongst them saw again 
The little Mermaid that, long years ago, 

Taught me sea-magic, many a mystic strain 
Of Siren song, and all the spells I know. 



MA RAH 
3 

All that she taught me, in the unmagical 
Monotonously wakeful world wherein, 

Toiling and moiling, I have wasted all 
My after-years in sadness that was sin, 



4 
I had forgotten, and her too. But she 

Was looking just as when I saw her last, 
Not here, but by that other happier sea 

Where we were playmates in the painless past. 



5 
And when I saw and recognised her there, 

The old song, all at once, and the old spell 
Came back to me. Along the moonlit air 

She si^li'd and beckon'd. I remember'd well 



A LOST CHANCE 
6 

The word I was to utter when we met, 
And half gave voice to it. But suddenly 

A cloud closed up the moon, and black as jet 
Became the solid darkness of the sky. 



7 
The vision vanish'd. I no longer felt 

Sure of the word. The night was full of doubt 
And fear. And I was conscious that there dwelt 

In its black bosom secrets not made out 



By any magic I had learn'd of old. 

So, passive, in suspense I stood, nor stirr'd, 
While o'er my soul the darkness closed its hold 

As a hand closes on a frighten'd bird. 



SA TURN A LI A 



Hid in the heaviest dark, a mystery 

Within a mystery, the sea augments 
Night's witchcraft with its shadowy sound ; the 
sigh 
Of an uneasy silence, that half vents 
In sobs and gasps the dreadful secrecy 
Of its contents ! 



And yet another mystery haunts the night : 

The uncouth, phantasmal, bodiless return 

Of Chaos. That which was before the light 

i 4 6 



SATURNALIA 

Comes back when light departs, and the deep 
urn 
Of darkness voids confusions infinite 
That seethe and yearn. 

3 
Ail spectres now resume their dim domain. 

A shrouded dream is passing o'er the deep. 
The scatter'd clusters of effaced stars wane 

Behind a livid film. The shuddering heap 
Of waters hoarser breathes. Athwart my brain 
Vast shadows sweep. 

4 
My waking self sinks from me. In its place 
There comes a sense of preternatural force 
Freed from thought's timid tyranny. The chase 

Begins. The phantom bugles blow. To horse ! 
I mount the Nightmare. Fleet thro' time and 
space 

Speeds our wild course ! 
147 



MARAH 



5 



Where are we hurrying, they and I ? And they, 
Who are they ? We shall find each other out 

As we go on, perhaps, and by the way 
Discover also what we are about. 

Heavens ! Is it you ? How came you here astray 
In such a rout ? 



They told me you were settled down in life, 
Well married, living far away from here 

In your own country, a good happy wife 
And mother, virtue's model, a sincere 

Church-goer, all whose decent days were rife 
With heavenly cheer. 



i 4 8 



SATURNALIA 



Yet here you are to-night, without a blush, 
Stark naked, riding furious at my side 

The Devil's own charger ! Foremost in the push 
Of this fierce crowd, and no attempt to hide 

Your unashamed enjoyment of the rush 
Of our wild ride! 



8 

Who is it you were laughing with just now 

Before you join'd me ? The tall woman there, 
With the gold fillet glittering on her brow, 

And those large long-lash'd eyes, and bosoms 
bare ? 
What is it hanging from her saddle bow 
By a tress of hair ? 



149 



MAR AH 



9 
Stay ! Now she has it in her hands. It is 

A dead man's head. And how her burning 
eyes 
Gloat on its horror ! How her red lips kiss 

Those white ones ! Yes, 'tis she. I recognize 
Herodias. But you never told me this. 
Who could surmise 



10 

That you were old associates ? And you, 

Whom have you loved to death, that you 
should be 
Here in such company ? Yon couple, too ? 
She with the man asleep upon her knee ? 
Asleep, or dead ? A nail is driven thro' 
His forehead. See ! 



SATURNALIA 



II 



With what still rapture her white fingers rove 
Among his matted curls, as low she bends 

Her glowing gaze his upturn'd face above, 
Husht as a watchful mother when she tends 

Her sick child, lull'd to sleep with songs of love ! 
So you are friends ? 



12 

I noticed that the woman, as we pass'd, 

Nodded to you encouragingly. Drums 
And cymbals ! Hark ! Behind us prancing fast, 

Here, with the head of Holofernes, comes 
Dame Judith, bravely dress'd ! And now, the 
vast 

Black midnight hums 



151 



MAR AH 



13 
With a mysterious far-off music. Songs 

Unholy, soft lascivious Lydian lyres, 
Shrill Phrygian pipes, and throbbing Scythian 
gongs, 
In wizard concert where, round monstrous fires, 
The redden'd gloom reveals dim dancing throngs, 
And loose-robed choirs. 



14 

O hasten ! Hasten ! If we get not there 

Before the dawn breaks, we shall be undone ! 
Our steeds flag, and we still have far to fare. 
Flog the jade fast ! The revel has begun. 
Faster! Our names are call'd. Death and de- 
spair ! 

Too late .... the Sun ! 



PERTURBATION 



GRAYER and dimmer grow the dim grey bounds 
Of the leaden twilight, Salter the sea's breath, 
And harsher, angrier, the low moan that sounds 
Yon crags beneath. 



The unquiet sea-birds seem unquieter, 

And more importunate their plaintive quest. 
About the sullen beach begins to stir 



A vague unrest. 



153 



MAR AH 



Sightless has set the ineffectual sun. 

There is no moon, no star, no visible cloud. 
But land, and sky, and sea are swathed in one 
Sepulchral shroud. 



And now that shroud is troubled, tho' unrent. 

There comes a menacing movement from afar, 
And sounds as of a distant armament 
Arming for war. 



5 

It is as tho' the elements — earth, air, 

And water — each in its own camp aloof, 
Were furtively beginning to prepare 
And put to proof 



PERTURB A TION 



Each its own weapons, or to organise 

Each its own forces, for some strife impending. 
Swift silent signals for the winds to rise 
The air is sending. 



7 
The sea is gathering from the outer deep 

Its heavier waves. Like some beleaguer'd giant, 
The land is setting fast on cliff and steep 
• A front defiant. 



8 

And coldly, shudderingly, creepily, 

With these awakenings of the torpid pain 
Pent in the pallid land, the pallid sky, 
The pallid main, 
155 



MARAH 

9 
My heart begins to move once more, and be 

Again the battle-field of ghastly hosts 
At war with one another, and with me. 
Legions of ghosts ! 



10 

Yet will the abortive stir beginning now 

Change or determine nothing. When 'tis o'er, 
Heaven, earth, and sea, and I, will all, I know, 
Be as before. 



II 

Rest, wretched slaves of Nature, whose mad zest 
Of movement makes the curse that you inherit 
Harder to bear ! Rest, winds and waves ! Rest, 
rest, 

Perturbed Spirit ! 
156 



STORM 



What is there here of aught experience knows, 
Or language names ? This movement without 
form 
Of hideous power in unproductive throes ? 
Storm ! Is it storm ? 



But like no storm I have ever heard of, seen 
Portray'd in pictures, read about in books, 
Or dream'd in sleep, the interminable scene 
Of sameness looks. 



MAR AH 
. 3 

There is no storm-rack visible. There are 
No thunders audible. There is no play 
Of forkt ethereal fires, no lurid glare, 
Nothing but grey ! 



Grey everywhere, grey always ! Day and night 
For what seems ages long have ceased to be ; 
And there is neither darkness nor yet light 
On land or sea. 



5 

Nothing but grey ! One part of it is air, 

Another water, and another earth. 
But of all shape and colour these three share 
A common dearth. 

158 



STORM 



Some horrible impulse moves the whole grey mass, 

Wrapp'd in such rain as no resemblance bears 
To any other rain that ever was. 
For this appears 

7 
A firmamental flood, that forward speeds ; 

Forward, not downward ; and in sheets, not 
drops ; 
Whose sweeping surge in a plain course proceeds, 
And never stops. 



There are no clouds, but all is cloudiness. 

There are no winds, but all the wide grey sky, 
Borne on the wide grey rain in mad distress, 
Is rushing by. 
159 



MA RAH 



There are no waves, but all the wide grey Ocean 

Jerks up and down with the recurrent thump 
Of a monotonous mechanical motion, 
In a livid lump. 



10 

From that mechanical motion comes a groan 
As of some mighty engine-beam or screw, 
Renew'd each moment with no change of tone. 
Mechanical too ! 



Mechanical, and yet with life at least 

Enough in it to make its meaningless cry 
More maddening than all noise of man, or beast, 
Or enginry. 

1 60 



STORM 



12 



Nothing, no single sight or sound, is here 

Either sublime or beautiful. But all 
Has in its dull enormity a drear 
Power to appal. 

13 

Such sameness with such terrible unrest, 

Such vast yet uneventful agitation, 
For days and nights have heaven and earth pos- 
sess'd 

Without cessation ! 

14 
For days and nights, so far as thought can tell, 
Had day or night survived ! But time, like 
space, 
Grown featureless and undefinable, 
No periods trace. 



MARAH 

15 
When first I felt the storm's approach, my heart 

Leapt up and hail'd it, glad of any change 
From the cruel calm, and eager to take part 
In something strange. 



The contemplation of repose and joy 

In Nature soothes not when the soul is sore; 
And to an aching heart a smiling sky 
Is a pain the more. 

17 
And so I hail'd a hoped enfranchisement 

Of grandeur, when this change began. Vain 
thought ! 
Great only in duration and extent, 
And grand in naught, 
162 



STORM 



18 



'Tis but a grisly chaos far and wide 

Monopolised by powers unbeautiful, 
Whose dulness, terribly intensified, 
Makes terror dull. 



19 

Dull as the incessant multitudinous strife 
Of the social world, that only magnifies 
Each meanness of the individual life 
To a monstrous size ! 



20 

The python is but an enormous worm : 

The reptile still a reptile, large or small 
The calm was dreary, drearier is the storm 
And that is all ! 
163 



DIMINUENDO 



Tired of the sun, and all it shines on ; tired 

Of life's bright baubles toss'd from hand to hand ; 
Tired of false joys that are but pains desired ; 
I seek a land 



Where sunlight looks like moonlight, and the days 
Like evenings, and things present like things 
past, 
And near things like things distant, thro' the haze 
Round all things cast. 
164 



DIMINUENDO 
3 

There, in a life no more than half alive, 

Let all my waking hours be half asleep, 
And sleep's self dreamless of whate'er men strive 
To gain or keep ! 



165 



MOON LAND 



Dim, lonesome, melancholy Moonland, hail ! 
My tired heart's home is in thy lap at last, 
And I have learn'd to love thy features pale 
As passions past. 



To me thy colourless cold sea and shore 

Have grown congenial, and thy sullen air, 
And ghostly winds that sighingly explore 
Boughs all but bare. 

1 66 



MOONLAND 

3 
Flowers in thy hueless herbage flourish not. 

But here dwell, hid in hollows of grey sand, 
Dwarf pansies ; and marsh-mallow blossoms spot 
The inner land ; 

4 
Where, at the setting of thine unseen sun, 

Small fenny pools gleam out of the dark plain, 
Staring at night, and after day is done 
Its glare retain. 

5 
Land of long silences, low whisperings, 

And sorrowful lights ! Familiar things, that 
seem 
Themselves elsewhere, look here like other things, 
As in a dream. 
i6 7 



MAR AH 



What are they, crouching yonder, crook'd so low ? 
Mere clumps of rock their misty forms may be, 
But wither'd hags, whose wicked trades I know, 
They seem to me. 



7 

That sallow sand-drift, where the shingles halt, 

A wasted remnant of myself appears. 
This stagnant tarn has in its ooze the salt 
Of human tears. 



8 

And all the land is loaded with a weight 

Of resignation to some torpid woe. 
The heavens are smileless, the fields desolate, 
The waters slow. 

1 68 



MOONLAND 
9 

Time makes not any effort to divert 

Aught here from its monotonous attitude 
Of dull distress. Each feature is inert, 
Each sound subdued. 



10 

What now it looks, the landscape seems to say 
That from the world's beginning it has been, 
And that its league-long lamentable grey 
Was never green. 



n 

Yet this, too, is illusion, like the rest ! 

The soil's fixt features Nature's fitful will 
Has changed and changed : and the immutablest 
Is changing still, 
169 



MARAH 



12 



Thro* transmutations every moment wrought 
By heat and cold, or damp and drowth ; and 
those 
That in commixture with my own sick thought 
It undergoes. 

13 
For 'tis not only by the tide-wave's toil 

That yonder coast has been so scoop'd and 
hack'd, 
Not only rains and rays that this lean soil 
Have scarr'd and crack'd. 

H 
My life's spent passions, sorrows, tears,, and sighs 
In the land's hurt have had their dismal part ; 
And the chief cause of its dejection lies 
In my own heart. 



MOONLAND 

15 
I know not how it was, nor why it is, 

But well I know that, whatsoe'er it be, 
The region round me has become like this 
Because of me. 

16 

Thou know'st it, too, sad Moonland ! That is 
why 
Thou dost remind me of it everywhere. 
Thy cold sun has the gaze of a grey eye, 
Thy sullen air 

The breath of a lost presence, miss'd how much ! 

Thy faint winds whisper words I understand 
Too well ! Thy stillness stirs me with the touch 
Of a dead hand. 



SELENITES 



Something sets trembling all the stars. A sigh 
Stirs the dark land. The moon is rising pale. 
Slowly a strange procession passes by 
Alone the vale. 



All women, and all beautiful, all white, 

All woebegone ! For many a thousand years 
The day has ne'er beheld them, and the night 
Their presence fears. 



SELENITES 

3 
A Seraph leads them. But of fallen state. 

His wings are clipp'd, yet still their size exceeds 
The limbs they lift not, and their heavy weight 
His pace impedes. 

4 

The moon alone knows what these women are. 

The sun was never in their secrets. They 
Know not each other. But one woe they share, 
One fate obey. 

5 

Whence come they ? Whither are their footsteps 
bound ? 
The Past forgets. The Future cannot tell. 
They have lost their place on earth, and none have 
found 

In Heaven or Hell. 

173 



MAR AH 



For Heaven not good enough, for Hell too good, 

For life too loving, and for death too dear, 
Pale ghosts of passion-wasted womanhood, 
They wander here, 



7 
Visible only to the tear-wash'd eyes 

Whose vision mirrors supernatural sights. 
But I, the initiated, recognise 
The Selenites ! 



SOMNIUM BELLUINUM 



I HAVE dream'd a bad dream, and it harrows me 
still 

With a horror of worse impending. 
I was plodding, persistently plodding up hill, 

And the hill was a hill never ending : 



On, I toilfully went in tenacious pursuit 
Of a something before me going : 

But if human it was, or divine, or brute, 
I had never a means of knowing : 



MAR AH 



For I neither could touch it, nor hear it, nor see 

Yet I steadily strove to attain it, 
Since I knew it was there, by a feeling in me 

That sufficed, tho' I cannot explain it. 



There was tree upon tree by the way that I went 
And each tree was a female Briareus, 

With its feminine arms about me bent 
In embraces vicious and various. 



5 

As a path of his own does the pioneer cut, 
Thro' the prairie his wild way clearing, 

So did I cut mine thro' those arms, and shut, 
As I struck at them, both eyes — fearing ! 

176 



S OMNI UM BELL UINUM 



But a shriek I heard as at each fresh stroke 
Thro' a shatter'd embrace I hasten'd, 

And was wet with the drip of the blood that 
broke 
From the clasp that a wound unfasten'd. 

7 

And before I again look'd up I knew 

That the thing I pursued had escaped me. 

It was gone. And a different scene, quite new, 
The bad dream I was dreaming shaped me. 

8 

For the hill to a plain had dissolved away, 
And the plain had no mark, no limit, 

But as far as my vision could reach it lay 
(Not a shrub or a shadow to dim it !) 



MA RAH 

9 
In the sultry embrace of a Syrian noon : 

And, along it confusedly streaming, 
A profusion of emigrant prodigies soon 

Rearranged the bad dream I was dreaming. 

10 

'Twas a monstrous procession. In front of it came 
The sleek Basilisks, hissing and sighing : 

In the forehead of each did a diamond flame, 
And the Wyverns were after them flying. 

ii 

But below were the Dragons with three-prong'd 
feet, 
And each Dragon was forty-footed, 
And they furrow'd the plain with the flap and 
beat 
Of their tails, and its sods uprooted. 
i 7 8 



S OMNIUM BELLUINUM 



12 



In a merrily gambolling company pass'd 

The lithe Leopards, and Ounces, and Lynxes : 

Then the Jaguars, Panthers, and Pumas : and last 
Came the beautiful leonine Sphinxes. 



13 

In their somnolent motion they seem'd to repose : 
Was it walking, or flying, or floating? 

Not a sound from their paws as they pass'd me 
arose 
The approach of their presence denoting ; 

H 
Not a fold of their filleted tiars was stirr'd ; 

Not a pulse in their peak'd breasts flutter'd ; 
But as murmuring seas by a slumberer heard 

Were the mystic enigmas they mutter'd. 



MAR AH 

15 
And their eyes were incessantly changing hue ; 

And each hue of them fitfully thrill'd me 
With a different pang. When those eyes were 
blue, 
Twas a passionate longing that fill'd me ; 



16 

When they alter'd to violet, from them came 

Indescribable desolation ; 
But when red, 'twas a frenzy of burning flame ; 

And when black, it was life's cessation. 



17 

The blithe Centaurs cantering came with a bound, 

And a rattle of arrowy quivers : 
Then a troop of green Gryphons, golden-crown'd, 

From the Arimaspian rivers. 

180 



S OMNIUM BELLUINUM 



There were two-legged Dogs with the airs of gods ; 

And, escorting Cat-countenanced Creatures, 
Supernatural Apes with divining rods 

And fatidical sinister features : 



19 
And a ponderous phalanx, serried and square, 

Of the man-faced Bulls of Chaldea, 
Whose bewildering bulks dead embodiments are 

Of the strength of a dread Idea. 



20 

From the back of each Bull rose four vast wings 

In a feather'd pavilion arching; 
And they all had the faces of bearded kings ; 

And their steps were as mountains marching. 

181 



MA RAH 



21 



But above the grim multitudes trooping in herds 
Thro' the Syrian sultriness glitter'd 

A tumultuous pageant of strange colour'd birds, 
And they hooted, and whistled, and twitter'd. 

22 

Clad in crimson, and orange, and azure, and green, 
There were Peacocks, and Parrots, and Loories, 

And Flamingoes, and Hoopoes, and Fowls ob- 
scene 
With the eyeballs and talons of Furies. 

23 
And the Hawk and the Ibis were carrying, both, 

Babylonian rolls of papyrus ; 
And the scripture thereon was the sentence of 
Thoth 
On the souls of Belshazzar and Cyrus. 
182 



S OMNIUM BELLUINUM 

24 

In the rear of the Birds with a wavering flight 

Came a flock of Chimaeras meagre, 
And a squadron of blue-wing'd Serpents bright, 

With their forkt tongues flickering eager. 

25 
But the Phoenix it was that commanded the 
whole, 
As its high priest, herald, and warder. 
In his beak he was bearing a fiery coal, 
And it burn'd with unquenchable ardour : 

26 

As a fiery coal had he made it to be, 

But I knew 'twas my own heart burning : 

For I felt the hot flame of it withering me 
With the heat of an agonised yearning. 

183 



MAR AH 

2/ 

And I cried to them, ' What are you going to do 
With my heart, all you prodigies bestial ; 

For what sacrifice fierce have you kindled it so 
With infernal fire ? Or celestial ? ' 



28 

In exorbitant wrath, when I cried to them this, 
They responded aloud and together, 

With an uproar as tho' from the riven Abyss 
'Twere Leviathan rending his tether. 



29 

In fuliginous films the disquieted sand 
Flew about, and above, and beclouded 

The insatiable sun ; and the shuddering land 
In a blood-red pall was enshrouded. 

184 



S OMNIUM BELLUINUM 

SO 

For the Bulls of Chaldea resentfully stamp'd 
In a bellowing band : and up bounded 

The roused Panthers and -Pumas: the Jaguars 
ramp'd : 
And the bows of the Centaurs resounded, 

3i 
As their darts flew about in the blood-colour'd 
gloom : 
Into rings where the Dragons contorted : 
In the eyes of the leonine Sphinxes was doom : 
The Chimaeras all whinnied and snorted : 



32 

And the green Gryphons yelp'd : and, like mur- 
derous priests, 
In pursuit of me fast, as I fled them, 

185 



MAR AH 



Came the two-legged Dogs and Cat-countenanced 
Beasts, 
With the Ape-headed Horrors that led them : 



33 
And the Birds and the Basilisks madden'd the air 

With a horrible screeching and hissing : 
Till at last I awoke with a clutch of despair 

At my heart. But too late ! It was missing. 



EPILOGUE 



My songs flit away on the wing: 

They are fledged with a smile or a sigh 

And away with the songs that I sing 
Flit my joys, and my sorrows, and I. 



For time, as it is, cannot stay : 
Nor again, as it was, can it be : 

Disappearing and passing away 

Are the world, and the ages, and we. 
187 



MAR AH 



Gone, even before we can go, 

Is our past, with its passions forgot, 

The dry tears of its wept-away woe, 
And its laughters that gladden us not. 



4 

The builder of heaven and of earth 
Is our own fickle fugitive breath : 

As it comes in the moment of birth, 
So it goes in the moment of death. 



5 

As the years were before we began, 

Shall the years be when we are no more : 

And between them the years of a man 

Are as waves the wind drives to the shore. 



EPILOGUE 



Back into the Infinite tend 

The creations that out of it start : 

Unto every beginning an end, 
And whatever arrives shall depart. 



7 

But I and my songs, for awhile, 
As together away on the wing 

We are borne with a sigh or a smile, 
Have been given this message to sing- 



The Now is an atom of sand, 

And the Near is a perishing clod : 

But Afar is as Faery Land, 

And Beyond is the bosom of God. 

189 



APPENDIX 



LORD LYTTON'S LAST POEM 



I HAD not thought that severance from her side 

Aught but a bitter pang could ever be ; 

Yet this — the first time flowing seas divide 

My days from hers, since that great day when we 

To one another all at once became, 

The sole man, I, and the sole woman she, 

Of a new world where nothing is the same 

As in the world that was, — e'en separation 

Reveals an unanticipated bliss, 

And all its pains find more than compensation 

In our completer intercourse. It is 

1 See Preface. 

193 



That for the first time also we can write 

Each to the other now without restraint 

Or insecurity. 'Twas in the sight 

Of others only that, while breathing still 

The same air, and still treading the same soil, 

We met ; save rarely, when our simple skill 

Was helped by some strong favouring chance to 

foil 
The dragons of my heart's Hesperides. 
And then the newness of our own desires 
That would not suffer joy to be at ease, 
And thoughts that, as along electric wires, 
Flash'd none but brief and broken messages 
Because the stint o' the costly time forbade 
Love's longed-for luxury of full utterance — all 
These interferences with freedom made 
Our meetings marred, and mingled drops of gall 
With the spoilt honey of their sweetest hours. 
But now such furtive signs and hurried hints 
Of feelings prison-bound by hindering powers 

T 94 



Find confirmation nothing checks or stints 
In the full-flowing fearless tenderness 
Of written words, wherein the loaded heart 
Loosens the long-pent and importunate stress 
Of its dear burden. Absence, too, presents 
A power (how often wished) to stand apart 
A little while from this new past of ours, 
This past so brief, so recently begun, 
Scarce older than the rose of August's bowers, 
And yet so full already of events, 
So rich in marvels and in memories ! 
And, thus, released from time's embarrassments, 
To sort and set in order one by one 
Its crowded treasures with undazzled eyes, 
Their wealth explore and realise as true 
Those bright confused experiences that seemed 
Whilst still so all bewilderingly new 
No surer than the sense of sweet things dreamed. 
Until, mere jumbled heaps of gems no more, 
But gem by gem in shining sequence spread, 

195 



Love in lone hours may tell his rosary o'er 

Nor miss one bead from memory's golden thread. 

Heart's heart of mine ! Till life's last lingering 

ray, 
Will it not light us, though its sun be set, 
That day of days, our memorablest day 
Among the woods and ruins ? Our lips met 
The first time then. 'Twas you that led the way, 
Which only you of all our number knew, 
For strangers to the land both I and they. 
The others followed us. I walked with you. 
And as we went you told me legends gay 
Of the dead rulers of those ruins green ; 
Counts of the Coast who there held royal sway 
In the land's old time. All breezy bright had 

been 
The days till now ; but this was silvery grey 
And soft and still. The path you led us wound 
Along low brambled copses glimmering white 
With giant hemlock. At the last we found 

196 



A sudden clearing where the hill was quite 
Unwooded. Ruin'd walls were tumbled round 
Bare slopes of grass, and nought beyond in sight 
But woods whose purple belts the prospect bound 
Beneath us and about us left and right. 
Poised on the sky-line of a little mound 
You looked and listened, and your woodland eyes 
Deepened, and from your lips came rippling clear 
A short quick laugh. ' Our friends are, I surmise, 
Still far behind us. Let us wait them here ! ' 
You said, and down you sat upon the ground, 
And I beside you. From the invisible sea 
Came to us a long lone melancholy sound. 
Else, all was still ; the hills, the woods, and we ; 
Stiller than sleep. I heard, as in a swound, 
My own heart beat, while side by side we sat 
So silent. All your drooping face was drown'd 
In a rosy glow. You loosed your mouse-grey hat, 
And where you laid it low upon your knee 
Round it I tried to wreathe — I know not what, 

i 97 



Some long * * * weed. You shook your 

brown curls free, 
And made an effort vain to smoothe them flat, 
And laughed again, but would not look at me. 
Then we began to talk of this and that 
In lifeless tones. Our thoughts from all we said 
And all the scene that we were gazing at 
Were far away. But we had grown afraid 
Of silence. You were plucking tufts of grass, 
And strewing them about you, blade by blade. 
I mused — ' How oft may it have come to pass 
That just where we are sitting here, we two, 
The ruins round us and the revelling mass 
Of the proud woods above us and below, 
And the sea's voice familiar yet forlorn 
Heard on the stillness, others sat before 
In the unreckon'd years ere we were born ? 
How often, too, when we shall be no more, 
Will others on the wood-girt hillside here 
Again sit talking while the day goes by, 

198 



As we are talking now — as vainly near, 
As falsely far with an inaudible sigh 
Between them ! Others ignorant of our case, 
Full of their own, and only moved thereby, 
Yet haply stirr'd like us by thoughts too dear 
For utterance ; and like us, : — at least like me, 
Babbling about the features of this place 
Albeit as heedless of them as can be ; 
Talking for talk's sake only, who the while 

Can only think of ' 

There you raised your face, 
And full on mine you turn'd it suddenly 
With swimming eyes and half heart-broken smile, 
Low murmuring ' Only think of — what ? ' 

But I 
Was silence-struck. Vain verbiage, brought to 

bay 
Abruptly by the sharp reality, 
Grovell'd with inarticulate disgrace, 
Dumfounded : Not a word more could I say. 



And shudderingly, all resistance vain, 

Like things caught up, and seized, and swept 

away 
By the unconquerable hurricane, 
We rushed together with a faint wild cry, 
Closed in a mute embrace that present past 
And future Love made boundless to engirth. 
How long did those transcendent moments last ? 
Enough to metamorphose heaven and earth 
And both our lives, whose old world vanishing 

fast 
Reveal'd a new world glowing into birth. 
When pillow'd on my breast lay pale, supine, 
The passion-tranced submissive loveliness 
Of your surrender'd beautiful soft face, 
Breathing faint bliss, with lips upturn'd to mine 
Half open, lids half closed ; and I could trace 
In the deep languors of those longlash'd eyes, 
Reveal'd at last, the whole pathetic tale 
Of all the martyrdoms, the agonies, 



The pangs and rendings such a soul as yours, 

Before it suffers passion to prevail, 

In its resistance to the fierce surprise 

Of love's invasion, silently endures; 

Then I remember'd that throughout it all, 

That time of dread suspicions, and fierce throes, 

And proud revolts and warnings augural 

Of evil, I, your poor friend, who Heaven knows 

Would, if he thus might spare you love's least 

ache, 
Or win you any blessing peace bestows, 
Have roll'd in Tophet's flame-pits for your sake, 
Must all that woeful while have been by those 
Ill-ominous denunciators made 
To wear the semblance of your worst of foes, 
The man of whom you should be most afraid, 
His love, a wrong your pride must needs re- 
sent, 
His presence your young life's most menacing 
And deadliest danger ; and yet none the less, 



Even when your heart most feared that dreaded 

thing, 
The shamed acknowledgment of love's success, 
Even when your brave soul was the most intent 
To save a noble pride from the distress 
Of arms surrender'd in a noble strife, 
That peerless perfect sense of justice blent 
With all the instincts of a high-born heart, 
Held fast ; nor ever did you stoop to vent 
The trouble that was torturing your own life 
On me, the cause of it. No peevish start 
Of sudden coldness meant to mystify 
The man who loved you ; no attempt to gain 
Respite for doubt by even the smallest lie ; 
No unjust word ; no cruel feminine art 
Of self-protection practised in disdain 
Of love's good faith. * * * 



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